Where am I at and how will I measure this?...

As my inquiry has now taken a new direction I needed to collect an additional set of time point 1 (TP1) data that can be used at the end of the year to provide evidence of shifts in teaching. As this is for inquiry purposes the information needed to be formative. It needed to identify our current strengths as well a identifying our areas for development. The Manaiakalani Reading Pillars of Practice (MRPP) matrix has helped me do exactly that.

After analysing my reading planning against the MRPP with Toreka, the next step was to work together to analyse her reading planning. On this occasion I took the lead but asked her to step in if I needed to relook at something. Again a rich conversation was had and a clear picture of where she is at captured. I then repeated this process with the rest of my team.

                                        

The feedback was really positive and discussions had were rich and honest. I think the high levels of trust play a huge part in this process and I want to thank my team for their parts in these conversations. This process fully was transparent and I openly shared my matrix with my gaps clearly identified. I think this helped in strengthening the buy in as it wasn't about finding out right and wrong but rather finding out where our areas of strength and areas to strengthen were. The latter have since become part of our co-constructed team PLD plan going forward.

The matrix for all initial discussions was very much a working document (see image above). This gave me an opportunity to identify what I saw in the planning and my team to talk to it. Sticking firmly to the idea that 'if it wasn't in the planning it wasn't there', allowed for consistency across the board but it didn't mean I didn't listen. Using pen and paper on this occasion meant any adaptations made were clearly visible to both of us. The part of this process that I really liked was being able to celebrate and sometimes point out, people's successes. I found that by doing this first the door was opened for those more challenging conversations to take place. 

The presentation below is the formalised version of these conversations. Each teacher has their own digital copy that identifies areas of strength, areas to strengthen and next steps.

From the perspective of team leader, I now have a clear and visual picture of where we are at and what it is we need to do to help accelerate shifts in student achievement in reading. 

Stocktake of my Inquiry...

My inquiry this year has been to say the least, challenging. Not because it is unachievable, but because my initial idea just wasn't working. I had several attempts at exploring the effect of our recent Reading PLD on student achievement but soon found out this wasn't going to work as my team are are all coming at this from different places. The PLD I have had differs greatly from what the others have had. My biggest learning has been the realisation that something I think is a normal part of a lesson is not necessarily seen the same through the eyes of others. It was also a real eye opener to realise the effect of staff changes on PLD, something I'm sure all schools experience. 

After speaking with Naomi Rosedale at the last COL meeting, I realised I needed to make some changes. Once I had worked out my new pathway forward things began falling into place. I had a plan and had begun putting that plan into place, but what was missing was the framework to bring everything together. Naomi suggestion was that I align what I was looking for with the Manaiakalani Reading Pillars of Practice. That was the lightbulb moment I needed.

Last year two of my team took part in the Reading Program Intensive (RPI) and although I didn't, I did join them in their journey through my role as a mentor. As a mentor I didn't get the explicit introduction to the Manaiakalani Reading Pillars of Practice (MRPP) so I needed to strengthen my connections. I did this by reversing the roles. This time it was me in the learning seat and Toreka in the mentor role, and turned into one of this richest learning conversations I have ever had. 

Together we analysed my long term reading plan and one randomly selected example of a guided reading plan against the MRPP.  As we unpacked each section I could see a clear picture of where my successes were and where my gaps were. Toreka was far more generous than me with this process. She kept saying 'I know you do this, I've seen you do it...' but I was of the opinion that if it wasn't in the planning it wasn't there. That decision allowed for consistency when I repeated the process with my team's planning.

The image above is the result of my conversation with Toreka. I'm sure to anyone looking at the writing all over the MRPP matrix it will look chaotic, but to me it's a rich summary of observations made, explored and discussed. I think what I liked the most in this process is that it is a true picture of my strong belief that we learn best when we learn with and from each other.

Causal Chain - mapping my inquiry...

As a part of the Manaiakalani Kahui Ako we are challenged to think about what we want to achieve then work backwards to map our steps. This is called a causal chain and is the logical thought process we follow to help us stay focused on on track throughout the entirety of our inquiries.

A causal chain is when a cause leads to an effect and that effect becomes the cause of another effect - A leads to B. B leads to C. C leads to D...start from D and work backwards Any intervention you design will (consciously or not) be based on a causal chain you have in mind - this is your theory of action.... To really understand deeply how teaching (as a cause) leads to a valued student outcome (effect), we need to know about more than just the first cause in the chain and the final - we need to know about each link.' - Dr Aaron Wilson

 

Link to my 2024 causal chain

Teaching as Inquiry 2024

Click here to see how I align my inquiry with the Manaiakalani framework.

“Recognising and spreading sophisticated pedagogical practice across our community so that students learn in better and more powerful ways...”

The Manaiakalani Community of Learning is working together on this task using the expertise existing in of our community of learning. 

Labels:

LEvidence, LScan, LTrend, LHypothesise, LResearch, LReflect,

CPlan, CTry, CInnovate, CImplement, CReflect,

SPublish, SCoteach, SModel, SGuide, SFback, SReflect

Mapping out my Hunches...

Mastery, in the context of professional development, goes beyond simply acquiring new skills or knowledge. It's about achieving a deep understanding and proficiency in a specific area of your field. It's a continuous journey of improvement, fuelled by a desire to be able to use the new learning effectively. 

If I think about myself in this situation. When I am introduced new strategy or concept in maths I usually switch off or shut down because I don't immediately understand what it is that I am being asked to do. Falling back on what I know and understand feels like a much safer option than been seen to 'fail'. It's not because I don't want to jump on the learning train, it's more that where maths is concerned, it takes time for me to process, understand and internalise the new learning. This differs greatly from my teaching buddy who has the ability to simply look at the new maths learning and somehow has the knowledge of how to use it and impart it with confidence. In maths she is a quick adapter and luckily for me is always happy to walk me through the new learning at a pace that works for me. As I said earlier it's not that I don't want to embrace the new maths learning, I simply just need more support to be able to make the shift in mindset and in practise. 

To guide my direction and help me narrow my focus I asked my team:

• What ideas from recent literacy PLD are you currently using?
• How has this strengthened your program?
• What encouraged you to make these changes?
• How does the PLD help shift student achievement?
• What stops you implementing new PLD?

From their responses I have compiled a list of hunches as to the possible reasons why teachers why choose to embrace or not embrace PLD. Although in the infographic below these are numbered, they are not listed in order of importance.

Qu 3: Building an accurate profile of students' learning - tools, measures and approaches...

Students who have achieved at a level considered to be 'below' the level they should be, are approximately a year behind the level they need to be at to make sense of the new learning. These are the students who with encouragement, scaffolding and explicit teaching will often make the gains needed to reach expectation.

Professional development empowers teachers with the skills to improve classroom practises, by introducing them to new learning which can make the changes needed in their practice to help strengthen the connections their students have to the learning. On occasions PLD is something that is simply attended so that a box can be ticked, but when embraced, can make a real difference. Sometimes despite having all the I's dotted and all the T's crossed shift does not take place. 

The conversations that often follow these results tend to apportion blame towards the student.... We have all at one stage or another heard phrases like '...did not connect to the test...'didn't read the questions carefully'... 'ran out of time'... 'was having a bad day...' It is only in recent times that we have been hearing teachers truly reflecting on their practice. What excites me as a team leader is hearing teachers identify where the gaps are in their own practice, then actively explore ways to try and fill these gaps. It the teachers who see student shift as a collaborative journey who make the most difference.

After the beginning of year data was collected and analysed at class level, this data was then shared at team level. As a group we celebrated our successes and looked at what teachers were doing in their classrooms to achieve these results. These strategies were then shared with examples that helped people see what it looked like in practise. Collectively we identified the support we would need to make both big and small changes in our practices, that would help to accelerate shift in all our learners, and together we formulated a plan that will help us get there.

The tools/measures/approaches:

• Planning 
• Long term
• Site DLOs
• Shared format
• Sharing time at syndicate meetings
• 10 minute quick tips that can be used in literacy
• Feedback from PLD and resources shared
• Classroom observations 
• linked to literacy
• Peer observations
• linked to literacy
• noticing ideas that are working and are embedded in the program
• Surveys
• Teachers
• Students - target group
• Time point 1/2 data analysis

Restating my inquiry question and chain of events...

This year I want to find out if a focus on spelling conventions foster an environment where word consciousness strengthens connections to the learning? Creating a causal chain helps me stay focused on the purpose of my teacher inquiry. We all know how easy to fall down many rabbit holes along the way so having a causal chain to look back on helps to keep me on track and visualise the end point. My initial post to introduce my causal chain is here.

At the start of term 2 my role in our school changed dramatically. I went from being one of three deputy principals to being the only DP. This change aligned perfectly with the start of my ERO journey so as I'm sure everyone will appreciate, my focus and time was spent co-constructing our matrix evidence. I found I was spending less time in the classroom and more time meeting the commitments of my DP role. Fortunately our students weren't bounced from reliever to reliever as Dianne took on the leadership of our day to day teaching component and I tried as hard as I could to be both a teacher and a leader. I quickly realised that I needed to let go of many of the lessons I loved teaching. The only one I held steadfastly to was literacy. That part was non negotiable. I was one year and one term into my T shaped literacy journey and didn't want to let that go so I had to learn how to be present in both roles. The flip side of this was that although I was using my teaching time to work towards increasing my learner's confidence using more powerful vocabulary and exploring affixes in an attempt to strengthen phonological and spelling awareness I did not blog my journey formally. Instead I had a Google doc full of notes that I knew I would be able to transcribe at a later date.

I capitalised on the PD provided as part of the T shaped literacy initiative and attended a number of online PD sessions run by The Literacy Place. This helped me grow as a teacher who knew I needed to model what I wanted my students to replicate. Looking back at the 'intervention' box on my causal chain kept me on track. I ended up using this like a checklist which meant I had a plan and was able to stick to it to help me achieve the goals I set for myself. When looking through my student's eyes, the reading responses both oral and written, to questions and provocations provided by our T shaped units, has continued throughout the year to be our record of their shifts in the complexity of their vocabulary choices from experimental to mastery. 

Celebrating the win...

This week the words I heard in our class speech competition completely stopped me in my tracks. Standing in front of an audience of their peers was every member of my reading groups confidently used the vocabulary we have encountered, unpacked and explored throughout our Reading units this year in context. Gone were the usual go-to's and in their place was a plethora of sophisticated vocabulary. This is a win in every sense of the word! 

To give my last sentence some context, the previous week I had taught an explicit lesson on speech writing. This lesson contained exemplars at a variety of e-asTTle writing levels. That meant my learners were exposed to a healthy mix of simple and more powerful vocabulary. One of our challenges involved applying our knowledge language features to edit an exemplar and move it to the next level. This is where my students very sound understanding of the more powerful vocabulary needed came to the fore. This then lead to a rich discussion as each group discussed their vocabulary choices and explained why they had made these changes. We applied the same strategy to levelling up the structural features.

Unfortunately the next few days saw me off sick, which meant my learners were left to work independently on their own speeches. I did share explicit instructions via email but knew these students would be working without guided teacher support. The comments tool in Google docs definitely gets a shout out here. I shared my feedback and left them to it. Move forward to today. I saw and heard the outcome of explicit teaching, creative ways of helping my learners connect to new and powerful vocabulary and a year long focus on affixes in action. 

My next step is to record some of these speeches that will be uploaded here so that I have a permanent record of what success looks like.

Causal Chain... A tool for planning and reflecting...

Link to causal chain

This year I want to find out if a focus on spelling conventions foster an environment where word consciousness strengthens connections to the learning? Creating a causal chain helps me stay focused on the purpose of my teacher inquiry. As I have said before, it is so easy to fall down many rabbit holes along the way so having a causal chain to look back on helps to keep me on track. Creating a causal chain allows me to visualise where I want my students to be at the end of the learning year, then map backwards the steps I will take to strengthen our (mine and my learner's) connections to the topic. 

My 'crusade' this year is to grow the vocabulary knowledge of akonga in my literacy groups. This year Dianne and I are undertaking a collaborative inquiry as we share a learning space. Although we are approaching this challenge in different ways, the reason behind it remains aligned. We have seen our students fall back on the familiar and simple words like 'went' when writing independently, possibly because don't  have the confidence to draw on the more powerful words that would move their writing to the next level. Our hunch is that reliance on the 'known' maybe due to the 'fear' of making mistakes when spelling the more challenging words expected at a Year 7/8 level. Spending time focussing on identifying meaningful chunks in words (root words, base words and affixes) might be the key that unlocks the door to the 'unknown' and may help my learners strengthen their vocabulary, spelling and decoding development in literacy so they are able to use and apply this knowledge when working independently..

Teaching as Inquiry 2023

Click here to see how I align my inquiry with the Manaiakalani framework.

“Recognising and spreading sophisticated pedagogical practice across our community so that students learn in better and more powerful ways...”

The Manaiakalani Community of Learning is working together on this task using the expertise existing in of our community of learning. 

Labels:

LEvidence, LScan, LTrend, LHypothesise, LResearch, LReflect,

CPlan, CTry, CInnovate, CImplement, CReflect,

SPublish, SCoteach, SModel, SGuide, SFback, SReflect

Qu 3: Building an accurate profile of students' learning - tools, measures and approaches...

Describe the tools/measures/approaches you plan to use to get a more detailed and accurate profile of students’ learning in relation to that challenge. Justify why you chose these approaches and tools.

Vocabulary refers to the knowledge of words and word meanings. Helping students become word conscious is a crucial endeavour for teachers across all levels, and more so for teachers working with students whose prior vocabulary exposure may be limited. One of the biggest hurdles I have observed when I ask my learners to complete a writing task is their problem solving skills when it comes to vocabulary choice. At some point in their learning journeys so far our learners have formed the mindset that making a mistake when spelling is not ok. This deficit mindset causes problems when it comes to experimenting and/or taking risks with new vocabulary. Additionally it stops the flow of writing and results in many students just giving up or embracing the idea that they simply are not good at writing or spelling. 

Dianne and I are carrying out a collaborative inquiry this year but have chosen at this point to work independently with different groups. Dianne chose the students who find spelling a challenge which has left me with the students who are more able spellers. Having collected the baseline data and captured student voice (shared in an earlier post), we have decided to adopt the strategy of divide and conquer. Our ongoing conversations about the spelling hurdles we need to 'knock down' have opened our eyes to the fact our students who struggle with spelling need a different intervention than those who have some understanding. We want our students to take risks but are fully aware that those who see themselves as 'not good at spelling' need to revisit the basics in a safe space where they feel empowered. 

The analysis below reflects the responses of the attitude towards spelling of the 25 students in our class who have shown in our data to be our more able spellers. When responding to the e-asTTle attitude question, ‘I am good at spelling’. 70% of these students see themselves as being good spellers, while in contrast 30% do not. It is the mindset of the 40% who’s thinking I need to change.

The tools/measures/approaches:

Planning changes:

Making time to implement anything needs to become a reality if any success is to be achieved. We have a dedicated time for Word Consciousness in our timetable so that we are accountable for teaching it and our students see this as something we value. In my group I have a mix of book work and digital work. We use dictionaries and thesaurus' to build skills and work both independently and collaboratively.

Student Voice:

Gathering student voice is a vital part of teaching. It gives us a clear picture of where our students are at, what they're thinking and what we need to do to allow of learners to make their individual connections to the learning. We have devised a Spelling survey which will completed at the end of each term, allowing us to measure both the small and big changes. 

Peters/e-asTTLE Assessments:

Analysing these results gives us a clear picture of what our students can do and where our knowledge gaps are.  We will use these results to inform our planning and identify shifts in achievement. 

Next steps:

• Explore creative and fun ways we can grow our word consciousness culture in our class
• Make word consciousness visible in our class
• Explore success in our school, other schools and other clusters 
• Professional Readings/ PLD
• Use student created DLOs as exemplars 

To sum up, we think limited word knowledge is the problem and now need to find out why it is the problem. It is not about weekly spelling lists, but rather meeting, noticing, unpacking, understanding, exploring and using a wider variety of words across the curriculum that will hopefully strengthen the spelling ability and word consciousness of the students in LS2 2023. Looking forward we feel that by addressing this now we will open the doors of learning wider when it comes to the transition into Year 9.

Restating my inquiry question and chain of events...

'Will a focus on Reading for Enjoyment increase student self efficacy and capability in Reading?' This is the question that is guiding my inquiry this year and is the question I keep coming back to when I need to refocus myself. My thinking behind this question has been if I open the doors that lead to opportunities for my learners to read for enjoyment I will open the doors that self efficacy is hiding behind. A few weeks ago I was chatting with Fiona about where I was at in my inquiry when she asked me how I was changing minds and ideas...

My earlier blogpost about my causal chain is here. I use this tool to keep myself on track and focused on my inquiry. Taking the time to evaluate where I'm at to write this blogpost, shows me that I'm meeting the goals I set. I have needed to reset timeframes a few times and this is something I think needs to be shared. Things happen along the way that cause us to lose focus or traction. It is how we get back on those tracks that counts, not how long it took us. 

Term 2 was a challenge for me as far as my inquiry was concerned. Erratic attendance, timetable changes and staff absences meant we weren't able to get the traction I had hoped we would at this stage in the year due to disconnects in continuity. Not an excuse just a real picture of the current climate many schools find themselves in. At the end of the term I worked alongside a group of students to help them create our LS2 RFE Holiday Challenge to help reignite my inquiry for both myself and my students. We 'sold' the idea to our parents at our student led conferences by having a wall display that each student explained to their whanau. Having such a visible display was the key to opening rich and purposeful dialogue about what reading for enjoyment is and why it is so important. It worked! My students and their families bought into the challenge and I was motivated after watching the challenge evolve online. 

                                 

Fast forward to Term 3... Reading for enjoyment (RFE) is firmly embedded into our timetable. We begin each learning day with all of us stopping and reading for enjoyment for 15 minutes. To help us keep track of the time we use a large purple egg timer as this not only ensures no short cuts with time but also gives those who need a visual guide, exactly that. 

I made sure I introduced the book I'm reading with the class and told them what made me want to read it. My current book is Bastion Point 507 Days on Takaparawha, Auckland, 1977-78 by Tania Roxborogh. All our students know that I love history so by sharing that I chose to read this text because I want to see the event from a different perspective (- I explained here that I only knew what I heard my parents talking about from what the papers reported at the time) I am also showing my learners that I am a lifelong learner. This text has lead to a number of chats with my students who have shared how some of their whanau were there and have told me about their memories of the protest. One student has even asked to read the book after me because her nan was there and she wants to talk to her about what she remembers. 

I had collected baseline data using Naomi Rosedale's RFE survey in Term 1 and knew that I was going to give my students the same Google form in Term 4 then compare the data, but realised the gap between time point 1 and time point 2 would be too long to wait to see if any change is taking place. I knew if wanted to capture a true picture I would need to get buy in from the class so I created a purpose for our challenge (statistics) and asked the students how we could record the time spent we reading for enjoyment over the next seven days. A number of suggestions were made with the most popular being that I create a chart to put on the board that the students would fill in each morning. 

This worked really well as everyone was able to add at least 15 minutes to the chart every day. The visibility of the chart kept it alive in the classroom and the larger times being recorded by some, motivated others. At the end of week 2 we had a set of data that we transferred to individual Google spreadsheets, graphed and analysed. To allow for comparisons to be made and measured we decided to collect data for the following week. A task made much easier when we harnessed the digital affordances. The end result had a number of outcomes:

1. Each student was able to see the progress in time spent reading for enjoyment. Those that had gaps were able to explain why, making everyone accountable to themselves.
2. I got a rich overall picture of the amount of time the class as a whole spend RFE.
3. We had an authentic purpose for our maths task that made the learning meaningful and purposeful.
4. The data collection served as an intrinsic motivator to encourage everyone to find time to read for enjoyment.
5. I realised that my students enjoy talking to me about the books they are reading so I need to continue to make time for this to happen.
6. My class respond well to reading challenges.
7. This challenge reminded me that I needed to drive it constantly. RFE is not an embedded habit in our classroom so I need to continue to motivate and encourage my students if I want them to pick a book and enjoy it.

Have a look at David, Farzana and Fotu's blogs to see what they discovered about their RFE habits.

Causal Chain... A tool for planning and reflecting...

This year I want to find out if a focus on Reading for Enjoyment increase student self efficacy and capability in Reading? Creating a causal chain helps you to stay focused on the purpose of your teacher inquiry. It is so easy to fall down many rabbit holes along the way so having a causal chain to look back on helps to keep you on track. My biggest takeaway from looking at a variety of readings is if we are to develop reading for pleasure habits in students we need a collective and collaborative approach that allows our tamariki to see role models at school and at home who value reading. 

Looking back at my causal chain I realise my students are seen as readers through our Leaders in the Library initiative, through sharing reading tips at our school assemblies and by actively reading for enjoyment in the classroom. It is important that my learners see themselves as readers too so I have made a point of capturing all of this in photos which are clearly displayed in our classroom. However when I look back at my causal chain I can see that because I'm always taking photos I have not been allowing my learners to consistently see me as a reader. As we approach Term 3 I know exactly what my goal is... make sure my learners see me as a reader too.

Link to causal chain

Qu 3: Building an accurate profile of students' learning - tools, measures and approaches...

Describe the tools/measures/approaches you plan to use to get a more detailed and accurate profile of students’ learning in relation to that challenge. Justify why you chose these approaches and tools.

Motivation is intrinsically related to engagement so learner engagement is vital if I am to establish a culture in my class where my learners are motivated to read for enjoyment and understand the benefits that reading outside of the classroom will bring them. My challenge now is to find out why the links in the chain appear to be broken again. To do this I will be looking at shift or change in:

• Disposition
• Data
• Reading mileage
• Student voice
• Vocabulary changes in personal writing

The tools/measures/approaches:

Planning changes:

• My initial approach will be to actively plan time in class for reading for enjoyment and the avenues of possible discussions this opens. This will help me to see where connections to the value of reading for enjoyment are being made. I realise if I want to encourage an intrinsically motivated habit I need to provide opportunities that allow my students to see the benefits that reading for enjoyment can bring.

Student Voice:

• Gathering student voice is a vital part of teaching. It gives us a clear picture of where our students are at, what they're thinking and what we need to do to allow of learners to make their individual connections to the learning. Naomi's reading for enjoyment survey is how I will measure progress and will be completed at the end of each term, allowing me to measure both the small and big changes.

PAT/Probe/e-asTTLE Assessments:

• Analysing these results gives me a clear picture of what my students can do and where our knowledge gaps are. I will use these results to inform my planning and identify shifts in achievement.

Click here to access the presentation

Learning Conversations:

• Learning conversations are a huge part of our learning time as it provides authentic opportunities for new ideas to be used in context. Sharing books that you have read allows you to tell someone why you found the story/content interesting. Being able to talk about a book in detail strengthens your connections to the text. After completing the baseline survey I was explaining that a part of our reading challenge will be to recommend the book to someone else when one of my students suggested we do more than that by identifying the person we think might also like to read the text and selling the text to them... Her idea was to make this a part of our library time and call it 'book chains'.  
• To do this effectively I will need to create speaking frames to scaffold those who need a bit more support to do this effectively.

Introduce a class Reading Challenge:

• LS2 Reading Challenge - This has been created to encourage my learners to read a wide variety of genres. I know that if this is to be successful I need to walk the walk and talk the talk. Going forward I want my learners to see me as a reader too, so I will be actively participating, cheerleading and motivating my learners in both this challenge and the book chains we will be introducing.  
• I will write a more detailed post about this idea once it has been introduced.

My next steps:

• Explore success in other schools/ clusters 

• Panmure Bridge School - What's happening already in our own backyard?

• Professional Readings

• Connect with public librarians 

• Connect with whanau to foster support for reading for enjoyment at home

• Use role models/student leaders to promote reading for enjoyment 

• Explore creative and fun ways we can grow our reading culture at PBS

• Make reading for enjoyment visible in our class

Qu 3: Building an accurate profile of students' learning - tools, measures and approaches...

Describe the tools/measures/approaches you plan to use to get a more detailed and accurate profile of students’ learning in relation to that challenge. Justify why you chose these approaches and tools.

My challenge this year is to strengthen the language and learning in maths that our students need to be able to actively participate in Talk Moves, so this can be harnessed and replicated in blog posts and comments. 

Link to causal chain

In all assessments our students are required to read and respond to questions. Often our students are not literate in their own language so the gaps that emerge when questions are written in english are getting wider, thus causing bigger disconnects in the learning. This year I want to implement the strategy of Talk Moves in Maths. Talk Moves is a strategy that promotes classroom conversations centred on maths that helps to improve students' understanding of mathematical concepts. It is a framework to prompt the discussion, and will allow me to capitalise on the learning I got from my inquiry in 2020 by providing authentic opportunities to use this 'talk' within blog posts and blog comments to help strengthen connections.

The tools/measures/approaches:

Planning changes:

My first step will be to introduce the Talk Moves framework into our maths program so that the discussion stems become the norm within our learning time. Being silent is not an option if acceleration is to take place so I need to model the language and support the use of questions which lead to justification like ‘How do you know it works?’, ‘So what happens if you...’, ‘What about if you say…does that still work’, ‘So if we...' 

Additionally I need to continue to actively plan time in class, for students to create blog posts, comment on each others blogs and respond to comments on their own blogs. This will help me to see where connections to the learning content are strong, and where gaps in knowledge are evident.

Instructional lessons:

I need to create opportunities for my learners to focus, notice and use the words that help us make sense of the learning, and not only model this, but also prompt the use of these words by providing opportunities for explaining strategy choice and use in groups within the lessons.

I need to use Jo Boaler's strategy of setting up positive norms in my classroom. Actively strengthening the growth mindset in my students might help to break down some of the barriers that stop them taking risks when solving maths problems or sharing their thinking.

Provide visible scaffold frameworks and rubrics to support the talk moves process that are used across the school. 

Observation:

After speaking to Kiri Kirkpatrick (MET) about the best way to gather baseline evidence she suggested I measure the amount of teacher talk compared with student talk in a maths lesson. To help me get an accurate picture, I have asked Kiri to observe me at time point one and time point two. Having the same observer will be a huge benefit as the continuity will be in place.

PAT/IKAN/GLoSS Assessments:

Analysing these results gives me a clear picture of what my students can do and where our knowledge gaps are. I use these results to inform my planning and identify shifts in achievement. I need to look closely at the language of questioning and the content specific language that is used in these assessments to ensure my instructional language aligns. I do not want my choice of vocabulary to be a reason that any student loses their connection to the learning.

Student Voice:

Gathering student voice is a vital part of teaching. It gives us a clear picture of where our students are at, what our tamariki are thinking and what we need to do to allow our learners to make their individual connections to the learning. I need to ask my learners what the barriers are that stops them commenting on blogs, replying to blog comments and contributing their thinking to class and small group discussions. It is only by identifying these barriers that I can devise a plan to help break them down. This is not a time for me to assume and act, it is a time for me to listen then act on the information I have heard.

Peer to peer talk:

Peer to peer talk continues to be huge part of our learning time as it provides authentic opportunities for new words to be used in context. I can see that buddying my learners up they can talk through a blog post then collaboratively decide the appropriate feedback and feed forward through dialogic discussion before leaving their individual comments.

This will also provide the opportunity for my learners to buddy up and talk through comments received before responding.

To do this effectively I will need to:

• Strengthen my own knowledge to the strategy of Talk Moves with professional readings
• Strengthen my own knowledge of the growth mindset process 
• Teach my students how to use Talk Moves 
• Teach my students what growth mindset looks like
• Co-construct group norms so there is a shared understanding of the expectations
• Provide lessons that allow for this to take place
• Monitor, observe and listen to my students as they are sharing and/or recording their thinking in their groups 
• Consider the times different students need for processing when grouping my students
• Gather accurate time point one and time point two data for comparison.

Teaching as Inquiry 2021

Click here to see how I align my inquiry with the Manaiakalani framework.

“Recognising and spreading sophisticated pedagogical practice across our community so that students learn in better and more powerful ways...”

The Manaiakalani Community of Learning is working together on this task using the expertise existing in of our community of learning. 

Labels:

LEvidence, LScan, LTrend, LHypothesise, LResearch, LReflect,

CPlan, CTry, CInnovate, CImplement, CReflect,

SPublish, SCoteach, SModel, SGuide, SFback, SReflect

TAI 2020 WFRC #3: Building an accurate profile of students' learning - tools, measures and approaches...

Describe the tools/measures/approaches you plan to use to get a more detailed and accurate profile of students’ learning in relation to that challenge. Justify why you chose these approaches and tools.

My challenge is to explore if strengthening connections to Smart Relationships will help my learners to understand and use content specific language and vocabulary in context. I feel that by doing this it will help my learners to make accelerated shifts across the board in reading, writing and maths. In all assessments our students are required to read and respond to questions. As with my previous inquiries I am very aware that it is often the content specific language along with the language of questioning that causes disconnects in learning. My idea this year is to use their blog posts and blog comments to help strengthen these connections.

Link to backwards map

The tools/measures/approaches:

Planning changes:

• My initial approach will be to actively plan time in class, (and now in our current distance learning situation), for students to comment on each others blogs and respond to comments on their own blogs. This will help me to see where connections to the learning content are strong and where gaps in knowledge are evident.
• Adapt lesson formats so that regardless of curriculum area we spend time thinking about how we can share our learning effectively on our blogs, and time thinking about giving and responding to blog comments that are linked to our learning. 

Instructional lessons:

• I need to create opportunities for my learners to focus, notice and use the words that help us make sense of the learning, and model this.
• Teach and model the Manaiakalani cybersmart lessons inside core subject areas to help my learners strengthen their understanding of the blogging process and understand how paying attention to the feedback received in blog comments can help them move their learning to the next level in context.
• Provide scaffold frameworks and rubrics to support this process that are used across the school. 

PAT/STAR/Probe/IKAN/GLoSS/e-asTTLE Assessments:

• Analysing these results gives me a clear picture of what my students can do and where our knowledge gaps are. I use these results to inform my planning and identify shifts in achievement.

Student Voice:

• Gathering student voice is a vital part of teaching. It gives us a clear picture of where our students are at, what they're thinking and what we need to do to allow of learners to make their individual connections to the learning.

Feedback:

• I need to fall back on the known by repurposing an idea I used in 2015 to help my learners understand what feedback looked like. This was done by sharing the story of Austin's Butterfly to help my learners see that by paying attention to the feedback given by his peers, Austin was able to make the changes he needed in his drawing to make it more scientifically accurate. By showing this clip again and unpacking the learning within, I hope to help my current students see the power giving and receiving feedback has in strengthening their connections to the learning.

Peer to peer talk:

• Peer to peer talk continues to be huge part of our learning time as it provides authentic opportunities for new words to be used in context. I can see that buddying my learners up they can talk through a blog post then collaboratively decide the appropriate feedback and feed forward through dialogic discussion before leaving their individual comments.
• This will also provide the opportunity for my learners to buddy up and talk through comments received before responding.
• To do this effectively I will need to create speaking frames.

Explore success in schools/ cluster initiatives:

• Panmure Bridge School 
• Manaiakalani and Outreach schools
• Manaiakalani Cybersmart resources
• Tuhi Mai Tuhi Atu
• Wairakei School - Link here  
• MIT/COL inquiries